Capt. Max Schmittberger of the West One Hundredth Street Police Station enforced the excise laws yesterday as they have not been for a long time. His policemen made many arrests.
    The Captain and a lot of detectives were at Waldron's dance hall, in One Hundred and Tenth Street, near Broadway, at 10:40 o'clock to see that their warning of "no dancing" was obeyed. Everything went smoothly until a man asked Mr. Waldron if he could dance.
    Before Waldron could reply Capt. Schmittberger told the man he would arrest him if he tried to dance. The man said it was a shame, that this town was getting "on the bum," and wanted to know why he couldn't dance. Rich folks, he said, had their way of amusing themselves, and it was not right to interfere with working peoples' amusements. Altogether the indignant man made quite a speech on the rights of man. A number of men and women at the tables vigorously clapped their hands and told him to go ahead.
    "I know me rights, and I'm going to dance," shouted the indignant man. Then he ran out on the floor and did about four steps of a waltz all by himself, the crowd calling to him to "go it, old man."
    "Pinch him; he's too fresh anyhow," said Capt. Schmittberger to his men, and four of them got the dancer.
    While they were waiting for the patrol wagon to come the policemen were the targets for all sorts of jibes. One man asked Capt Schmittberger whether he remembered the night he "pinched Mayor Van Wyck." The man's question plainly annoyed him.
    I've a notion to raid this joint," he said to his men.
    Just then the patrol wagon backed up and took the dancer. He proved to be Frank B. Campbell, forty-two years old, of 187 West One Hundred and Sixteenth Street.
    "Why don't youse people dance?" he shouted from the wagon. His question was answered by a young man and a girl. They started to waltz. Half a dozen detectives stopped them, and hoisted them into the wagon. They said they were George White, twenty-four years old, of 969 Amsterdam Avenue, and Miss Maye Blake, twenty-four years old, of 161 East Twenty-eighth Street.
    Capt. Schmittberger then arrested Louis Waldron, one of the proprietors of the place. He charged him with aiding, allowing, and abetting dancing in disregard of the Sunday laws and his, the Captain's, warning. The other prisoners were charged with disorderly conduct. All were released on bail given by F. J. Schnugg of 1 East Ninety-first Street.
    Other arrests were made for excise violation by Schmittberger's men. They were as follows:
    James Brady, forty years old, bartender in Cryan Brothers' Raines law hotel, 103 Columbus Avenue; John Reilly, in his own saloon, at 855 Amsterdam Avenue, and Andrew Dorn, thirty-two years old, bartender in Joseph Erdrich's saloon, at 985 Amsterdam Avenue.

    Deputy Commissioner of Police Bernard J. York's second attempt yesterday to give Brooklyn a Puritan Sabbath was no more of a success than was his first effort on the preceding Sunday. From the malodorous banks of Newtown Creek to the surf-beaten sands of Coney Island not a "dry" spot was there to be found.
    There was a great show of activity on the part of the police during the day, but apparently little came of their efforts. Mr. York's orders to close up merely resulted in the saloon keepers doing business with more caution, and not much more caution at that. The extra caution consisted of the employment of "lighthouses," who, however, had an easy time earning their money. In the Borough Hall district, and other down town sections the usual Sunday conditions prevailed.
    The only parts of the borough noticeably affected by Mr. York's orders were the Eastern District and Coney Island. In the Eastern District the proprietors of two large halls were arrested for alleged violation of the Sunday regulations, and in this section, as at Coney Island, the police compelled the separation of dancing and beer selling. The men arrested were William Texter, the lessee of the Arion Hall, 11-19 Arion Place, and Edward Winkoop, the lessee of Schwaben Hall, at Knickerbocker and Myrtle Avenues. A ball was in progress at each place when the arrests were made by Police Captain Gaus and Detectives French and Fegvarise. It was said that both Texter and Winkoop courted arrest and intend to make a test case. They were arraigned in the Ewen Street Police Court. Magistrate Kramer adjourned the hearing until to-day.
    For so early in the season, Coney Island had a lively Sunday yesterday. It was estimated that about 20,000 persons visited the resort during the day. All but a few of the dance and concert halls were open for business, and many other amusement enterprises were running.
    Thirty policemen, under Inspector Campbell, were sent down to the island from the down-town precincts at noon to help the local force handle the situation, but they had little to do. Some excitement was caused among the resort keepers in the early part of the afternoon by a report that Deputy Commissioner York was on his way to look things over. The saloon keepers and others who were dodging the law were very uneasy for an hour or so. Then it was learned that the report was a false alarm.

Source:

Unknown, "Defied Police and Danced," The New York Times, New York, Monday, 1 April 1901, p. 2.

    Edward Winkoop, mentioned in the above article, is not strictly speaking a member of the United States branch of the Wynkoop family, since, apparently, he had Germanic roots. He and his children and grandchildren figure in a fair number of news reports in the New York Times from the late 1800s to at least the 1970s. One of Edward's grandchildren, Paul Winkopp, (which seems to be the preferred spelling), directed the Columbia University satiric theatrical review, held every spring, for quite a number of years during the 1920s and 30's. Paul's brother, Vincent J. Winkopp, was a well known banker, and of course, Edward, himself, was quite prominent in the Germanic community in the early decades of the 1900s. He ran a number of music halls and took an active part in Germanic music societies.

    Chris